Trong Huu Phan

STUDENT EXPERIENCE

TRONG HUU PHAN

Nationality: VIETNAM

Admission Year: 2016

Department Of Chemistry, 2nd Year PhD Student

National Tsing Hua University/ Molecular Science and Technology (MST) Program, TIGP, Taiwan

Advisor: Prof. Jer-Lai Kuo

“During last 2 years learning and doing research in IAMS, there are many interesting things and skills that I have learned. The problem-solving skill is the one that I find the most valuable. Doing research means you have to struggle with plethora of problems you have not known before, that is when you are trained to stick right to the problem, figure out the roots and propose the solutions and eventually the problem is solved. The solution sometimes is good, sometimes is bad, sometimes it does not work at all, but anyhow, you will find yourself what you are lacking of, what you need to improve, and how much you are ready to do research independently.”

WHAT IS YOUR LEARNING EXPERIENCE HERE AT THE TIGP-MST PROGRAM?

General Topics

Generally speaking, the education system in Taiwan is not so much different from Vietnamese. Student are required to select courses at the beginning of the semester. Mid-term and final exam are basically required, and the exam is generally designed to cover the content taught in class; hence, as long as students pay enough attention to lectures, they will pass the exams in certain. Besides that, some special courses also require teamwork, conduct small research, presentation. The program here generally encourage self-study and teamwork, these are the things that I think very essential for doing research.

Academics

I learn a lot and improve my skills significantly. The post-doc who is my mentor in research and my advisor have supported my greatly. During last two years, I acquire myself lessons and skills of using simulation package like LAMMPS, Gaussian.  Through the project, I gained in-depth knowledge on thermodynamic, quantum chemistry, and got my hand dirty on applying the obtained knowledge in real project from alcohol to sugar, using various methods from molecular dynamic simulation to DFT calculation.

The research also came along with challenge. Dealing with difficulty when the progress get stuck trained my skills of how to detect the problem, and solve the problem step-by-step. In sugar project, my job is try to determine the transition state of given reaction mechanisms with a set of various conformers. Having to deal with large set of conformers is truly a major difficulty. Eventually, the problem is solved by developing a tool for automatically launch the guessed configuration that is assumed to be close to transition state configuration. The tool itself proved it effectiveness so that the progress can speed up remarkably.

Personal Experience

People here is helpful and friendly, my lab mates, mentor, and advisor are very kind and supportive. There are many Vietnamese Association in Taiwan with various interesting activities such as Cultural Exchange Activity, Sport Competition. Joining these groups is very good to socialize, release stress, and learn more about other cultures.

WHAT ARE THE PROS AND CONS OF STUDYING HERE IN TAIWAN?

Pros

1.         Geometric distance: Taiwan is fairly close to Vietnam, so moving back and forth is fairly cheap.

2.         The living expense and tuition fee in Taiwan is fairly cheap while students can access a high quality education system.

3.         Vietnamese student community in Taiwan is quiet big. This is a big advantage since student can easily get the support (such as finding room…) especially when students are first arrived and started to adapt the living here.

4.         People here are very kind and friendly. (My landlord gave me two bicycles to commute to work ^^.). Taiwanese students generally are smart and discipline, we can learn a lot from them.

5.         In Academia Sinica, there are many seminar talk from invited speakers worldwide sharing their breakthrough research. It is the advantage for students to learn the recent research trend, the research life and experience from the speakers.

6.         International learning and researching environment: TIGP Students are coming from diverse countries. Such international environment will benefit students in improving English, communication skills. Each culture has its own way of thinking and working style, through co-working students will also learn the interesting things from other cultures.

Con

The official language is Mandarin. It is a little trouble since not every Taiwanese people are able to speak English.

WHAT ADVICE WILL YOU GIVE TO STUDENTS WHO ARE INTERESTED TO STUDY HERE?

Just go ahead, don’t be afraid. Every has their own safe zone, so do I. Safe zone is likely to be comfortable to stay in , however it also avoid you from discovering amazing thing outside.

You'll never enjoy your life

Living inside the box

You're so afraid of taking chances

How you gonna reach the top?

 (“Waiting outside the lines” lyrics – Greyson Chance)

For those who interested, I would like to share my own experience from the time I first arrive here until now. It has been a long journey but thanks to opportunity that brought me here, I did learn and grow a lot.

I first came here and worked as Reaseach Assistant. At that time, my English wasn’t good enough. I had little confidence to convey my idea and found it difficult to communicate with others. Gradually, I realized that it wasn’t my English insufficiently good, it was my tendency to avoid facing problem is the point that made it hard to improve my performance, both in English and research. I learned to be more outgoing, willingly ask and discuss on the point I don’t know. It is true that communicating/conveying ideas in English is challenging, getting stuck in your research progress is challenging, but step-by-step, if you are determined enough, the problem one-by-one can be overcame. For me, I passed the TOEFL iBT test to qualify English requirement, I wrote report, presented by progress in English. That is to say, English is not a challenge to me anymore. For research, more or less like English, it is another challenge. As aforementioned, in research, problem-solving skills is of great importance. But if you are well-prepared and determined, it is great experience for you to go through.